A Game i Play With Myself

I count the squares. How many more are left? How many squares can I get hooked today?

I keep an index card.   

                                  Wednesday.   Thursday    

 Square started.           16.                       8.    

 Square empty.               4.                       3.

 Square completed.     15.                     24.

This motivates me. Well it did for a while. Then it got to be really boring and I rolled it up and put it in the corner. 

Waiting for the school bus. Both of them love kids. Not just my grandchildren, but all children. I believe Henry thinks the whole world is here to pet him. He sits with his right paw up and just waits. He's so sweet. Daisy is much more feisty. She will knock them over in her greetings. 

I bought 20 bags of mulch today. My flower gardens are getting greener by the day. Spring has arrived in Ohio. Yay.

Rug Update

 I've continued to work on the rug from my class with Katie Hartner. Again, I cannot say enough nice things about her. I've got the border hooked, now I just need to tweak the flowers. This is an Eagle's Nest Woolen named Sherry's Bouquet. 

I've also been working on my hit n miss rug. It's mindless hooking. Sometimes that's just what I want. Other times it gets extremely boring. I've come to realize this will be a bear to zigzag the edges. I might just go with what's already there and deal with the bit of excess. I've never zigzagged a piece before hooking, but I think I should have on this one. It's going to be a good size rug measuring 30x40. 

I love spring time. I like to go outside and look for what has grown, or what is blooming. I like to hear the peepers at night, and the birds singing in the morning. I don't have many flowers yet, but the promise of blooms is there. 

Looks like the wind blew the trellis over.

Here comes the lilies and iris,

The tulips.

And the poppies. This has tripled in size from last year. I love poppies. it looks like it's going to be a good year for flowers.

The Price of Eggs

 I still find it difficult to believe eggs cost so much. They are $5.97 at Aldi's. Six dollars for a dozen eggs seem crazy. 

I went to Planktown yesterday. Planktown is a Mennonite community with several stores and greenhouses. Today I picked up a dozen eggs at 4.00, some freshly ground beef, and fresh chicken thighs. 

Look at these beauties.

There is also a hardware store that sells all the stuff I need for soaps, lotions, etc. They sell the essential oils, flavor oils, speciality carrier oils, the containers, etc. Everything. Another market with great deli meats and cheeses, a butcher shop, a quilt shop, a bent and dent store, and many greenhouses and nurseries. It makes for a fun day.

Here's another beauty. Lexi is 16. She spends the night with me a couple of times a month. I will miss that. I see less and less of her as she grows up. Soon she'll be off to college and off on her own. I can feel that tug on my heart already. 

Another Sunday. Dinner will be chicken and gravy over biscuits and/or mashed potatoes.

Enjoy your day. It's to be 70' today, but it is windy and raining. Tis spring.

Sue 

It's a Fairy Tale

 A couple of weeks ago I had a friend, who is cleaning out their attic, give me boxes of kids books. I shared some with Connie at Wool Yankers and some to the little neighbor boy. And I still have a box of books. So many books. 

In those boxes were three large books of fairy tales. 

So I've started reading them to Mac in the mornings before school. We are enjoying them immensely. Many stories are ones I'd never heard of before. I thought the two blue books were the same, nope it's more tales. Ones like Little Claus and Big Claus or Little One Eye, Little Two Eyes, and Little Three Eyes. At first Mac missed his morning TV time, but now looks forward to story time. Which I think is great.

I used up the rest of the walnut dye. Since I didn't boil the walnut juice down it's more like a tint than a true dye. A couple of folks mentioned they thought it would turn out darker. I didn't know what to expect. I like the softer tint. 

On the left is the original, the right is what I dyed. Again the wool is blue, again I like it. 

It's another cold day here in Ohio. But I know spring is one the way. 

Sue

That Daisy

 

So I was already in bed, had been for about a half hour. I hear a dog barking from the front porch. It sounded like Daisy. But it couldn't be Daisy because I don't let her out the front door. I thought it must be the little neighbor Yorkie who sometimes gets out of his fence and comes to visit. So I got up, sure it would be Milo, and low and behold, it's Daisy. She must have snuck out whilst I was carrying in firewood. That Daisy. She is so fast. 

I was grateful. She'd been outside for an hour or so. Grateful that she knew to come home, grateful that she barked to be let in, grateful she didn't get hit on the road or attacked by the fox or coyotes. But boy did she smell. Not skunk, but foul from her face and neck. She is a digger and probably was having quite a good time. 

All is well. She slept in her crate, I gave her and her collar a good scrubbing. Hopefully the bed in the crate doesn't smell too bad. I have it outside airing. 

That Daisy.

And just because. These are my two favorite little boys. 

All is well. Sue

Walnut Dyeing, the Lazy Way

 This occurrence of dyeing really was the lazy way. I have three walnut trees in my yard. My son who mows for me insisted that I pick up the fallen walnuts. He says it makes for a very bumpy mow if they are on the ground. Plus last year he got a case of juglone poisoning. 

Anyways, I had picked up most of them and tossed them into the woods. The few that I would find at a later date I just tossed into a bucket to get rid of at a later date. Trouble is, winter came and I didn't empty the bucket. The walnuts have stewed all winter. My bucket was starting to get full of water. So I took some empty milk jugs and filled them with the walnut sludge. 

Yesterday I decided to see what happens if I use that sludge water to dye overly bright wools. I didn't take a before picture. I wish I had. When the wool was wet it had a greenish undertone to it. I dried it overnight by the wood burner and voila, pretty wools. Most of the wool started out as blue or aqua. The two pieces on the far left were a creamy color to start with. As per usual, neither photo of the finished wools are quite right. But I think they turned out great and I certainly will do this again. 

Have a happy Sunday. I have the smoker going and am smoking a pork butt for Sunday dinner. Yum. 

Sue

Rug Camp with Katie Hartner

 Last week Lauren, of Rugs and Pugs, and I went to Pennsylvania for a three day class with Katie Hartner. She was such a a sweet teacher. This was the best camp I've attended for years. The room was a bit crowded, but other than that, all was wonderful. Just wonderful. 

This was my rug. I wanted a soft look and I think I am achieving that goal. Keeping it in only in medium and light values has been more difficult than I thought it would be. The camera shows a few areas that may need to be changed. Like that leaf top right. 

Here are the other folks rugs. 

This woman was punching her rug. She says it works better for her. And it looks just like a regular hooked rug from the front. 

This one is Lauren's rug. It is so cute. 

Today is a better today. The pain is less, I'm definitely more awake. They did pinch my upper lip and I have quite a sore lip. But things are looking up. 

It shouldn't take me much longer to finish up my new rug, just in time for spring. It's almost here. Almost.

Sue

I'm down and out today

I came home to have a procedure on my esophagus. I had surgery on it about  four years ago and scar tissue built up. I'm not feeling great. Hopefully tomorrow is better.

Sue

I Have Flowers

 So... My friend Lauren showed that her garden has flowers. I went outside to check my gardens. And, no flowers. 

Then today I looked again, and yay, I too have flowers. It's been warmer. I even saw a couple bees. It's supposed to get up to 70' by the end of the week. 

And even a dandelion. I'll leave it as sometime it's the only flower for the bees.

My sad looking flower garden. But I know in a couple months it will look pretty. 

Looking forward to a good week. 

Sue

Ohio Weather

 It's Ohio for sure. This week we had two days of high winds, I think it got up to 40 mph. Then two days in the 60's. Boy did I like that. Kip and I played outside for a couple hours. He's getting pretty good on his scooter. Then there's today.

They're saying they want to play in the snow. 

Tomorrow I'm headed up to Wool Yankers. It's the closest rug hooking shop to me. I'm hoping to pick up some light brown wool for a class next week. Lauren and I will be heading to Pennsylvania for a three day class with Katie Hartner of Woolley Fox. 

Have a nice weekend. 

Sue

Hit n Miss

 My newest rug is coming right along. The only thing I've had to cut is the black. 

And this is my tote of worms. It still is very full. I thought by making this rugs I would use up most of my worms. I was wrong. The second photo is my worms the day I started. 

I Gave Up

 I gave up trying to control these worms. I tried the bags, I tried piles, I tried solo cups. None of these worked for me. I just kept making a huge mess. So I went through all my bags of worms as they were already separated by color. I picked out the ones I wanted to use. I tossed aside those that were too bright, too multicolored, too plaid. And then I tossed them all into a tote. And this seems to be working. 

I have extras of almost every color, except green. I used a lot of green in the garden rug.

These are some of the ones that didn't get chosen. So therefore, I still have a lot of worms to use up. 

I'm making progress, this is the end of hooking day #2. 

Mac and Lexi will be spending the night. Tomorrow I'll take Mac to Home Depot for his monthly build session. I was going to take them to Maple Sugar Days at Malabar Farm, but the weather is to get much cooler overnight. So maybe next weekend. My favorite thing is the taste testing of the fresh syrup and visiting the store. We always get some maple sugar candies and cotton candy. They take you up the hill to the sugar making cabin in a horse drawn wagon. It makes for a fun day. 

Have a wonderful good weekend.

Sue